Paul Simon Sings for Africa

Paul Simon (right), and Mark Stewart perform at a fundraiser for the Turkana Basin Institute Wednesday at the Highline Stages in Manhattan.

A fast-joking bid caller in a tuxedo and a Stetson cowboy hat was talking up the stakes for a Yamaha guitar signed by Paul Simon, as an audience filled with philanthropists such as David Rockefeller Jr. sat amused.

After the guitar sold for $19,000, and exotic trips including a Kenya safari and an Antarctic voyage were auctioned, Richard Leakey, the Kenyan paleoanthropologist, looked out to an audience which paid $50,000 to $250,000 per table to see Mr. Simon perform for a fundraiser.

“This next item is for those of you who have egos–and I see there are a few in the room,” Leakey said, referring to the naming rights to a newly discovered African insect species he plans to auction on eBay.

Moments later, Simon stepped out and enchanted this rarified audience–which also included Imax Corp.’s CEO Richard Gelfond and the conductor Lorin Maazel–with a half-hour performance of some of his classics.

Simon began with his “Sounds of Silence,” accompanied by ponytailed virtuoso Mark Stewart on a cello.

He continued on with renditions of “Slip, Sliding Away,” “Hearts and Bones,” Junior Parker’s blues standard “Mystery Train,” “Mrs. Robinson,” George Harrison’s “Here Comes the Sun,” “Me and Julio Down by the Schoolyard” and “The Boxer.”

Simon’s voice started a bit shaky and slightly offkey, but it soon caught a groove. He whistled during Me and Julio and played bluesy riffs on “Mystery Train.”

During the bridge in “The Boxer,” Stewart played a wooded instrument he called a “pocket saxophone.” He joined Simon on acoustic guitar and background vocals for most of the other songs.

Between the auction, the table donations and a matching grant, the event — held at the Highline Stages in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District — raised about $2.5 million for the Turkana Basin Institute, its organizers said.

The nonprofit institute, founded by Leakey and Stony Brook University, supports archaeological research into human prehistory and related earth and natural science studies around Lake Turkana, in a remote region of Kenya and Ethiopia.

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